Director’s Report

Challenging Times, Reasons for Optimism

Published: 3rd February 2017 | Issue 40 Share article:

Rob Bartlett, BVAA Director

Rob Bartlett, BVAA Director

We continue to regularly recruit new and lapsed members, but despite this, it has been troubling to see hard-won recruits evaporate due to mergers, leading to an overall net drop in membership.

No trade association CEO welcomes contraction and consolidation, and when it is in the full knowledge that you must still service essentially much the same customer base, with less resources, it heralds challenging times ahead. But as I’m now in my 24th year of trade association work, one comes to understand the cyclical nature of the economy, and the everchanging nature of British industry and thus association membership.

The valve industry and its Association, BVAA, has however been incredibly fortunate to ride out a number of recessions in recent years, indeed largely deflecting them, with only the latest crisis in the oil and gas sector finally impacting widely. At the Secretariat, we were already in good order, and we put steps in place early to ensure continued service levels, while operating a leaned-down operation ourselves.

We are all used to finding efficiencies, but doing so against a background of reduced income across a swathe of activities, whilst endeavouring to deliver against a list of new demands, is a special challenge. Being adventurous and prudent at the same time is hard to pull off! BVAA has however won through this year, with remarkable success, and we’re in good shape for what now thankfully looks like the green shoots of a recovery.

The launch of the Business Development (BD) Group, focussed on providing business opportunities for members, quickly led to a number of new initiatives, some of which are delivering immediately, while others are still developing and bedding in. I was also delighted to be able to welcome Rob Boycott to the BVAA team in the newlycreated support role of BD Consultant, and Rob will work towards helping us deliver on the BD-focussed services members tell us they need.

Martin Greenhalgh’s Technical Groups continue their renaissance, with more groups meeting and addressing technical, standards and related issues through the larger committees and also the life-limited Technical Expert Groups.

The single activity I found most rewarding personally however was the Future Leaders Programme, more of which later. To see our industry’s talented rising stars blossom into confident, more richlyexperienced individuals was a real joy, and bodes well for our industry’s future.

No matter how insightful the ideas generated by BVAA’s supportive Chairman, it’s Board and now the new BD Group, to whom the whole membership owes a substantial debt of gratitude, a CEO can only deliver if he is supported by a fantastic team. I am delighted to say this is very much the case at BVAA and I take this opportunity to publically thank Martin, Karen, Isobel, Barbra, Chris and latterly Rob Boycott for all their support.

Search related articles:   British Valve and Actuator AssociationIssue 40BVAA NewsBVAA Annual Reports

Recent magazine news articles